Courtesy of WOWSA, Huntington Beach, California.

48 teams, 15 solo swimmers, and 7 teams of yak swimmers challenged the weather conditions in the 9th annual Clean Half Extreme Marathon Swim in Hong Kong. Swimmers from a number of countries began at 11:00 am from the main beach in Stanley and swam to Deep Water Bay 15 km after between 3 and 5 hours later.

The swim has attracted solo swimmers from Australia, Germany, Malaysia, United Kingdom, Singapore and Hong Kong.

“This is the 9th year of this amazing swim, celebrating the amazing waters that Hong Kong has to offer, linking sports and awareness for the environment in the same race. This year, as usual, no plastic water bottles were used at the race, but baseball caps made from 100% recycled plastic bottles were provided to the participants, meaning over 1,200 plastic bottles were pulled from the waste stream in order to make the caps, effectively making this a ‘plastic positive’ race where more plastic was pulled from the environment than was put into it,” said race director Doug Woodring.

Each relay team had 5 members and an accompanying boat for support. Each swimmer swam for 20 minutes for the first rotation of the team and then swam in 10-minute intervals thereafter until the race finished in Deep Water Bay. A portion of the proceeds from the event was donated to Ocean Recovery Alliance, a Hong Kong-based charity that focuses on ocean protection and the reduction of plastic pollution.

Copyright © 2015 by World Open Water Swimming Association